Pakistani Cleric Charged with Sedition

Pakistani police lodged criminal charges against a cleric who helped negotiate a peace deal with the Swat Valley Taliban, accusing him Sunday of aiding terrorism, sedition and conspiring against the government, a police said.

Sajid Mohmand, the Swat police chief, said the case against Sufi Muhammad was lodged in a police station in the valley, where Pakistani troops still skirmish with militants even though they are winding down an offensive launched three months ago.

Muhammad is to be formally charged by a court, a move expected in the coming days.

The peace deal the cleric helped negotiate imposed Islamic law in the valley, which the U.S. had warned could turn the region into a safe haven for insurgents. But the pact collapsed in mid-April after Taliban militants infiltrated a district south of Swat, and the military moved back in.

Muhammad, father-in-law of Swat's notorious Swat Taliban leader Maulana Fazlullah, was detained last Sunday near Peshawar.

The case against him could indicate Pakistan is moving away from its past willingness to negotiate with militants, but it also could be a way to pressure Muhammad to reveal any information he has about the location of the Swat Valley Taliban's leaders, who have evaded capture despite the military offensive.

The charges in the complaint against Muhammad stem from comments he made during an April speech in which he condemned democracy and elections and said Pakistan's constitution was un-Islamic.

The speech revolted many people in Pakistan, leaving even some hard-line Islamist political party leaders silent, and it was considered to be an important factor in shifting public opinion against the Taliban.

Pakistan's government relied heavily on Muhammad's contacts with the Taliban in the Swat area to try to achieve a peace agreement earlier this year.

The pact imposed Islamic law in the region in exchange for an end to two years of fighting - much to the chagrin of the U.S. and other countries who warned the deal effectively ceded the valley to the Islamist militia and created a safe haven for insurgents.

Muhammad, himself, does not control the armed militants in Swat, and its unclear how much impact his detention will have on the insurgents fighting in the scenic valley.

But he mobilized thousands of volunteers to fight in Afghanistan after the U.S.-led invasion in 2001. He was jailed in 2002 but was freed last year after renouncing violence.

The Swat Taliban's ability to re-emerge will depend more on their leaders, including Fazlullah. The army says Fazlullah has been wounded, although the Taliban reportedly deny it. None of the commanders is definitively known to have been captured or killed.

Some 2 million people fled the region in the early weeks of the offensive, and although hundreds of thousands have returned in the past two weeks as the military operation winds down, sporadic fighting continues.
By Associated Press Writer Asif Shahzad